After its loss to Microsoft's Windows in the 80s and 90s Apple is determined to use lawsuits to avoid facing a similar fate with Android. (Source: Columbia University)

Apple wants to ban sales of all Samsung Android tablets and smart phones. Samsung is the world's top maker of Android smart phones and tablets. (Source: Phoenix New Times)

Apple and Samsung are currently 1-for-1 in court rulings

Adding to its growing pile of lawsuits [1][2][3][4][5][6][7] against the popular Android operating system, Apple, Inc. (AAPL) has filed suit in the U.K.'s High Court alleging South Korea's Samsung Electronics Comp., Ltd.'s (SEO 005930) has copied its tablet and smartphone designs.

I. Victory by Any Means Necessary

If Apple had patented the design of the Apple II back in 1977 and the technology behind it and then sued its top rival manufacturers, it might have succeeded in killing the coming consumer PC revolution. If that had happened, consumers might have been forced to use Apple computers in the 1990s and 2000s. Instead Apple opted for a less litigious approach -- to try to compete with its "closed box" model. Ultimately it lost, fading into a distant second place amid the deluge of machines powered by Microsoft Corp.'s (MSFT) Windows operating system.

Today a very similar story is playing out in the tablet and smartphone markets. In three years Google Inc.'s open Android operating system leaped from a 1 percent smart phone operating system market share to nearly 50 percent of sales, outselling Apple phones 5-to-2 in the latest numbers. And it's closing fast on Apple's tablet market share, leaping from approximately 3 percent a year ago to approximately 30 percent of tablet sales in 2011. Android is winning by offering more selection and more customization options to users.

Apple recognizes this familiar state of affairs. But this time it's determined not make the same mistake and try to outcompete its more open, more diverse rival. It's taken to the courts to try to sue Android's top smartphone and tablet makers out of existence. It's hoping to convince the court that it deserves a government-enforced monopoly on modern tablets and smartphones, thanks to its strong intellectual property catalog.

And amazingly it's scored a major victory in one of its first two court rulings. A German federal court ruled that Samsung had infringed on a 2004 design patent which depicted a fat touch screen computer with only a power button. The German court ruled the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, which is much thinner, has side buttons, and is a different aspect ratio infringes on the "minimalist" Apple Community Design.

Presiding Judge Johanna Brueckner-Hofmann remarked upon delivering the verdict, "The court is of the opinion that Apple’s minimalistic design isn’t the only technical solution to make a tablet computer, other designs are possible. For the informed customer there remains the predominant overall impression that the device looks."

However, the ruling essentially grants Apple a monopoly on all rectangular multi-touch based display tablets with one button or less on the face -- the current industry standard. In that regard, Apple, pending appeal, was handed an effective monopoly on tablet sales in Germany, the European Union's third largest market.

II. Fight Continues to Expand With British Filing

In Britain, Samsung got the jump in the legal fight. After Apple sued it in court in the Netherlands and Germany, Samsung sued Apple in Britain, claiming the iPhone and iPad infringe on its patents. Now Apple has responded with yet another suit.

Both the suits are currently sealed and the patents involved have not been made clear. Based on previous lawsuits it seems likely that Samsung's lawsuit revolves around Apple's use of wireless technology, which Samsung believes it owns the rights to. Apple's suits are likely based on Apple's aforementioned "fat iPad" Community Design (somewhat akin to a patent) and on Apple's technology patents, such as its notorious multi-touch patent.

The new lawsuit brings the number of lawsuits between Apple and the top Android handset maker to 20. The other lawsuits include:

Apple is also suing Google subsidiary Motorola Mobility Inc. and Taiwanese phonemaker HTC Corp. (SEO:066570) in numerous regions. In Britain, there's a suit against HTC, in addition to the suit against Samsung.

III. Victory for Apple is Uncertain

While some think that the German decision gives Apple a major victory, there's no concept of "legal precedent" between separate EU legal jurisdictions. In other words, the German decision has no official impact on the British case.

Further, Apple essentially lost its case in the Netherlands, where a judge ruled that Samsung did not violate Apple's "fat iPad" community design. The court found Samsung only guilty of infringing on one minor patent on scrolling, which it remedied by altering Android's built in Android app. Thus while Samsung tablet sales are banned in Germany, they are free to continue in the Netherlands.

Additionally, several U.S. graphics designers (with an eye for design detail) we spoke to in recent weeks expressed credulity that anyone would think Galaxy Tab was similar enough to "fat iPad" pictured in Apple's design patent to ban the Android device. They said they found it unlikely that many international courts would side with the verdict of the German court's elderly judge.

And if Samsung can win some of its major countersuits -- such as the British or U.S. counterclaims, it could force Apple into a cross-licensing agreement clearing the way for it to freely sell its devices in currently-contested world markets.

In that regards Apple's hopes of tablet and smart phone hegemony via lawsuits may face failure either directly in its cases or in its rivals scoring victories in their countersuits.

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Samsung MAKES components for Apple devices for christ sakes, and they turn around a sue a business partner over this silliness? This is just insane. Someone needs to make them stop.

And for all you people like Tony supporting Apple in this, it's refreshing to see such hypocrisy. You slammed Microsoft for decades for being a monopoly, but have no problem supporting your Apple trying to sue to be the sole provider of tablets on the planet.

quote: And for all you people like Tony supporting Apple in this, it's refreshing to see such hypocrisy. You slammed Microsoft for decades for being a monopoly, but have no problem supporting your Apple trying to sue to be the sole provider of tablets on the planet.

Apple don't want a monopoly in the monopoly market. They just want a monopoly of tablets based on their designs. Apple's competitors are free to develop their own approach to designing a tablet, as Microsoft has done in the OS field with Metro. It is painfully obvious to all but those rendered irrational by Apple phobia that Samsung have copied Apple. You may think copying Apple is OK but to deny it has happened is just silly.

Maybe you'd only be happy if everyone else designed grey tablets with plenty of front mounted buttons (because despite being like the Star Trek PADD from First Contact, it wouldn't bear any resemblance to an iPad... right?). And, for the final time, Apple have ADMITTED to stealing ideas shamelessly. Who developed the first smartphone? Clue: it wasn't Apple.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news... you can't talk sense in to a delusional nutcase, who's busy wanking to Steve Jobs and Phil Schiller (last reference taken from Tony's post below).All he read was blah blah blah "it wasn't Apple", and there sets off the rage of red.None the less, thanks for feeding the troll, as I look forward to the manically funny insanity to follow. :-p

quote: Maybe you'd only be happy if everyone else designed grey tablets with plenty of front mounted buttons (because despite being like the Star Trek PADD from First Contact, it wouldn't bear any resemblance to an iPad... right?). And, for the final time, Apple have ADMITTED to stealing ideas shamelessly. Who developed the first smartphone? Clue: it wasn't Apple.

This old chestnut. Christ how desperate are you guys.

Picasso had a saying "Good artists copy, great artists steal". This was the quote that Steve Jobs used and which you sad people cling onto as if it was some sort of secret truth about Apple. Jobs was quoting Picasso.

So what does Jobs mean by using this quote and then going onto say Apple had been 'shameless about stealing great ideas'? Well presumably he quotes Picasso approvingly because he thinks it's what Apple does. What does Picasso mean? Well he says 'Great artists steal'. What he means is not that great artists copy someone else's work and add nothing new but the very opposite - great artists steal by building on what went before and then adding something new, something amazing.

So did Vincent Van Gogh copy Gauguin, did Gauguin copy Vincent Van Gogh? No. Both looked at what the other was doing, was inspired, took the best of the what the other was doing and made something new. That's what great artists do. That's what Apple does and has always done. They look around, see what people are doing, look for the best of what is going on, learn from it and then build something new, something better.

And right there is the difference between Apple and many other companies, the difference from Samsung for example and from what Microsoft used to do: which was just copy. Nothing new, no aspiration to create, to be innovative, to make the new better than the old. Just the sad boring noise of the photocopier.

It doesn't have to be like this. There is always room for the new, for trying to be better, look at Microsoft which has, in a move which astonished me because I didn't think they had it in them, actually tried to build something new with Meego rather than just copying Apple.

Stop defending mediocrity. Support innovation. No more clones. Support the new.

Oh, so what you're saying is, this is Apple confronting Google (or rather, in a misguided fashion, anyone but Google) with a razor blade before it runs off and cuts off a part of its own left ear lobe?

There are literally countless examples everywhere of people taking inspiration for something, and there are literally countless examples of downright fabrications. Food, drink, consumer goods, cars... yet there's been a lot less fuss in general than we're getting now with Apple trying to protect something despite, by its own admission, stealing ideas for these very products in the first place. Competition is a healthy thing. Why can't you and other Applephiles grasp this?

There is little evidence that Apple builds "better". Yes, some Apple devices look exceptionally nice, some weigh very little, some are very easy to use, and so on, but let's not forget that this is the company that was pedalling Core2 Duo machines until last year as if they were new technology. This is the company that got into hot water over its product names (iPhone and iPad aren't even Apple names, and did anybody at Apple - ironically - bother checking the Patents Office?). This is the company that, somewhat amusingly, tried to sue a small Australian company who wanted to put DOPi on their own range of Apple laptop bags and cases (tried, and failed). This is the company that didn't even invent the smartphone. This is the company that was once accused of trying to provide discounts to Apple stores to the detriment of independent retail outfits that stocked Apple products. This is the company that tried to sue New York City over the use of an apple logo, claiming it would serve to confuse (as if). This is the company that doctors imagery to gain injunctions against competitors for producing competing devices by making them appear almost identical.

Put simply, this is the company that "invents" an idea then sues the crap off anyone else for coming out with anything similar. I won't deny that Apple products would have been inspiration for both Android as well as Android-using products, and I won't deny that Apple have released some very significant devices, but suing companies based off a concept is ridiculous to say the least. It's like suing over how many wheels a car should possess. What's more, Apple lock you into their products with their closed ecosystem; why on earth would anybody want to leave such a perfect scenario (!)? By eliminating its competition, Apple is not only ensuring that people stay in that loop, but it will harm innovation as well - who will try to enter a market monopolised by a single company when there's little hope of success? What impetus is there for Apple to improve its products? Imagine the processor market if AMD were forced out by Intel - would we even be on the 2nd generation Core processors, let alone the 1st?